The Review

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Thursday, June 30, 2011

There is perhaps nothing more aggravating than when conservative candidates and Republican officials are confronted by liberal activists who chastise them for their “support of Big Oil,” and the only response they can muster is a stammered slur of equivocations. In the past month I’ve seen this situation replayed over and over, with only a single official handling the situation with anything resembling deftness. In today’s political climate, there is no excuse for this being a “gotcha question.” It’s time we messaged this issue properly.

Democratic lawmakers in Washington have called for an end to energy subsidies such as those given to “Big Oil” companies operating in the United States, pointing to $4 billion in subsidies the five largest oil companies receive each year. Their reasoning has emotional appeal: with a lagging economy, rising national debt, and worsening unemployment levels, subsidies to rich oil magnates are simply enriching “fat cats” at the expense of hard-working Americans. So how can we compete with this picture? It’s easy: stick to the facts.

Earlier today we on IR proposed the idea of adding "political views" to the special protection categories listed in the Illinois Human Rights Act. Maybe you thought we were exaggerating the problem of mean and spiteful liberals using every means possible to shut down, intimidate or stifle conservative thinking.

Today, a local Chicago media outlet is running a story about Fox News conservative talk show host Glenn Beck. Here's some of the comments that's Tweeting on that story. Still think we're overreacting?

We enthusiastically support the “Cut, Cap, and Balance” framework for debt-ceiling negotiations and are committed to opposing any deal that fails to follow it: substantially cutting spending immediately, capping it going forward, and adopting a balanced-budget amendment with strict tax and spending limitations. But for the cuts to go beyond a blip on the otherwise relentlessly upward march of government spending (or worse, amount to accounting gimmicks), they must be based on specific, structural, permanent reforms to grow the economy while lowering the trajectory of federal spending. Moreover, without those reforms, caps will prove unenforceable when they get overwhelmed by entitlement promises, or when the political pendulum swings back toward tax-and-spenders.

In general, government hates activity it cannot tax or control. Government hates the non-geographic nature of the internet because the reach of web is global but the jurisdictional boundaries of governments have geographic limits. Now there is another new law in California to impose a duty on internet retailers such as Amazon to collect sales tax on purchases they think are made by residents of that state. This greedy and counterproductive tax policy in Illinois and other states is yet another clumsy attempt to make an end-run around a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Quill Corp. v. North Dakota 504 U.S. 298 (1992).

Obama is the worst demagogue we’ve had in the office of the president since Franklin Roosevelt, a man who also severely attacked the evil rich at every turn. And, as a reminder, FDR’s actions lengthened The Great Depression by years. Like FDR’s economic failures this president has nothing to offer the nation but class warfare.

Over the weekend, conservative talk show host Glenn Beck's family had a unnerving experience as they viewed an outdoor showing of a Hitchcock classic at a local park. Beck shared with his radio audience earlier this week how his family was harrassed and verbally intimidated. At one point, a nearby antagonist kicked a glass of wine onto Beck's wife's back. Not one person stood up to defend Beck, who, because of his notoriety, decided it not best to publicly respond.

When we first heard about this, it was pretty clear that the Beck family were pbullied, the current plague that has gripped our public school system. Teachers are being taught how to deal with bullying, beauty queens are on anti-bullying tours, kids are told to report anyone they see bullying. Verbal intimidation on the Internet and on air waves is a public nuisance and threat. But there's still a reason for which discrimination and bullying is permitted: if you're of the wrong political persuasion.

WEST DUNDEE, ILLINOIS—Citing the need to tackle the state’s chronic mismanagement and economic crisis, Kane County Board Chairman Karen McConnaughay today announced that she will not seek a third term as the County Chief Executive, but will run for the Illinois State Senate in District 33.

Before a crowd of supporters on the River Walk in West Dundee, McConnaughay, (R-St. Charles) pledged to work to get Illinois back to work and to reduce the size and inefficiency of government. She stated that Kane County and the rest of the state will not be able to realize economic recovery until the state government makes serious changes to reform the way it does business.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

About 150 years ago, voters across our then adolescent country selected a gangly Abraham Lincoln to lead our nation during one of it's darkest days. While he was not an exceptionally good looking man, he had a great intellect and was a man of great principle. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was similarly elected during one of our nation's most severe economic times about 80 years ago. He was elected even though he had polio and wasn't able to get around like most. Reporters protected him and didn't publish pictures of him in his wheelchair. One of my heroes, Winston Churchill, was a portly, cigar chomping politician who led his country through one of its darkest times. The common thread with all three of these men is whether or not they would be elected today in our media circus and our vain view of candidates. They weren't handsome or robust, but they were arguably the right men for the job (well, except FDR did everything wrong, but that ruins the flow of the article).

HOFFMAN ESTATES - U.S. Rep. Aaron Schock of the 18th CD reviewed highlights of his first two years in Congress last year at Right Nation 2010. Plan now to be there again, to be energized and encouraged. We need conservatives from throughout the Midwest to stay in the battle and plan to be there for our Midwest conservative action conference November 3 thru 5th, 2011. For more info, go to www.rightnation2011.com.

Exxxotica Expo 2011 -- a traveling "adult" entertainment show and erotic convention -- is coming to the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center, which is owned by the City of Rosemont. Organizers are expecting this 3-day xxx-rated gathering to attract roughly 20,000 people.

Exxxotica Expo 2011, or as its promoters refer to it, an "adult circus," is billed as one of the biggest porn conventions in the country. It will offer sex seminars as well as 24 hours of "live entertainment" with "bondage and burlesque entertainers" and "women performing on swings, poles, stages and trampolines," according to organizer J. Handy. Handy claims Rosemont has been more helpful than any other location where they've held this.

The Beatles may have had you and Chicago -- the whole state even -- in mind when they sang "I get by with a little help from my friends.” Local politicians will entice you, excuse you, and if you don’t mind terribly, use you.

U.S. Senator Dick Durbin is a good friend of illegal aliens and a stalwart supporter of the DREAM Act.

U.S. Representative Luis Gutierrez is your other friend. He’s on record saying, “I have only one loyalty, and that’s to the immigrant community.”

Clearly, Barack Obama's 2012 campaign is preparing its base for a disappointing campaign fund report June 30th. Here's what the campaign just sent out: "We measure our success not in dollars, but in people ..." Right. Or shall we say "Left" ... as in they've left him?

Dear Friends:

We're closing the books on the first fundraising quarter of the 2012 race at midnight tomorrow.

A lot of folks will be interpreting our numbers as a measure of this campaign's support.

For all of candidate Barack Obama’s campaign rhetoric promising to respect Congress’s authority to draft the nation’s laws, President Obama has demonstrated a persistent pattern of circumventing the legislative branch via administrative fiat whenever his agenda stalls. And though one of the Obama campaign’s legal advisers cautioned against a President who would "take the law into his own hands and shred it when it's convenient," he has done just that time and time again.

The Obama Administration generally employs one of two strategies to legislate without—and often in spite of—congressional action: (1) administrative decree establishing a new federal rule, or (2) a refusal to enforce existing federal law. In five separate policy areas, the President and the federal agencies under his command have spurned congressional authority to achieve Obama’s objectives.

The conviction of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich on multiple charges of corruption is not funny, it is sad. And it is symptomatic of a culture of corruption loo long condoned in Illinois by millions of peoiple in big ways and small. One day I sat in a barber shop chair in Downers Grove and the barber knew I was active in local politics. He asked me if there was someone his wife should "go to see" in order to pass her exam for a beautician's license.

PELLA, IA - "This isn't about me, it's about America," Sarah Palin told the audience in her spontaneous remarks following the premiere of "The Undefeated," a film about her political journey. She still remains evasive as to whether she'll enter the 2012 race to be the GOP's presidential nominee.

With the MSM banned from access to the official opening in Pella Iowa last night, this video allows the only documentation of her remarks.

Americans for Prosperity - Adam Berkland

Yesterday the President’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released a report touting the virtues of federal regulation – in many cases, they found, the net benefits of federal regulations outweigh their associated costs. This is unsurprising and even desirable: we want laws on our books that improve the overall well-being of American citizens, so long as those laws do not obstruct freedom or impose disproportionate costs on the economy.

In the Gallup survey, 72 percent of Americans say they back Obama’s overall plan to withdraw 33,000 troops in the next year or so and then to hand over control of Afghanistan to the Afghan people by the end of 2014. Twenty-three percent oppose it.

UPDATE -- CNBC reports 18 were killed . But with 10 innocent victims killed by a Taliban-related terrorist group and NATO troops called upon to end the hotel siege, perhaps Gallup should authorize another poll? AP writes:

One Blagojevich trial juror from southwest Tinley Park expressed what most Illinoisans were feeling Monday afternoon in the Tinley Park Patch:

Asked if she's angry about Blagojevich's actions, [Karen] Wojcieszak sighed and shook her head in dismay.

"It just makes me wonder, are we the laughing stock of the U.S.?" she said. "He's like so many other Illinois politicians who took an oath to serve the people … He didn't come through. We have so many corrupt politicians here. Now, we officially have one more."

It's shame that Blagojevich had to join the state's line of crooked elected officials, she said, adding that he was just as charismatic as any politician she's seen speak.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

I suppose it all started on MTV back in April 1994 when President Bill Clinton appeared with 200 students on a contrived town hall type meeting. 17-year old Laetitita Thompson, daughter of a journalist, asked the President of the United States, "Is it boxers or briefs?" Mr. Clinton answered the mornonic question with "Usually briefs." and "I can't believe she said that." Fast forward to a few days ago when Chris Wallace asked Rep. Michelle Bachman (R-Minnesota), "Are you a flake?" This came on the heels of an equally idiotic line of questions from John King of CNN at the first GOP presidential debate panel.

WASHINGTON - In response to a New York Times Article entitled, "U.S. Plans Stealth Survey on Access to Doctors," United States Senator Mark Kirk (R–Ill.) is circulating a letter among Senate colleagues in advance of sending a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius requesting the details of the survey. The article, which outlines a proposed government program to secretly obtain information from primary care physicians, highlighted numerous complaints about the proposed program from doctors ranging from concerns about the secretive nature of the surveys to the misallocation of government funding. The final version of this letter will be sent with additional signatures this week.

Maryland is the first state in the country to impose a new requirement to graduate from high school -- something called environmental literacy.

But what is that? That is the question State Senator J. B. Jennings is asking.

"What kind of education is it going to be?” he asks. “Is it going to be fact-based? Or is it going to be theory-based, which is usually politically, theory driven. And you can think, it's going to be about global warming or climate change."

INDIANAPOLIS — An order handed down by a federal court Friday temporarily suspends a provision of an Indiana law that defunds abortionist organizations like Planned Parenthood, but the order upheld a key provision that requires women to be informed that “human physical life begins when a human ovum is fertilized by a human sperm.”

The order explained that “the language crafted by the legislature in this provision supports a finding that the mandated statement refers exclusively to a growing organism that is a member of the Homo sapiens species.”

The newly enacted Illinois Workers’ Compensation law falls short in a number of ways, according to State Senator Kyle McCarter.

“This new law will do little to prevent the kind of fraud and corruption which plagues our workers’ compensation system for employer and employee alike,” said McCarter (R-Lebanon). “It will also not significantly reduce workers’ comp costs, which are among the highest in the nation.”

Governor Quinn signed the legislation Tuesday and flew around the state to talk up the new law at multiple stops but McCarter, who pushed the workers’ compensation reform issue to the forefront this spring, said he’d like to see changes to the law debated and adopted by the Legislature during the fall Veto session.

Last Friday, Pat Quinn signed into law the new Congressional map for Illinois, capping off the legislative redistricting process in the same manner that it began: disingenuous and non-transparent – the opposite of what Quinn promised on numerous occasions.

On November 6, 2010, Quinn said: “I think the process should be open.”

Reading about elected Republicans in Illinois complaining about the redistricting legislation Governor Quinn just signed and promising to change it through the courts ought to remind conservatives of a few basic truths around here. If our party wants to become a force again, which often seems like a big “if” in the Land of Lincoln, it has to set the very simple goal of taking power away from the Democrats and returning it to the people.

Monday, June 27, 2011

The new law permitting Civil Unions did not change the Illinois income tax laws. Under the income tax act, you may file a joint Illinois income tax return only if you file a joint federal income tax return. Married couples and partners to civil unions who file separate federal returns may not file joint Illinois returns.

Also, the legal explanation of the effects of the Civil Union law on Illinois income tax:

Today's decision by the Blagojevich jury that found him guilty on 17 of 20 counts, could possibly add up to 320 years in federal prision. It reminded IR's editor Fran Eaton of a Tweet the former Governor sent her back in April.

SPRINGFIELD- State Senator Darin LaHood (R-Peoria) has issued the following statement concerning the conviction on corruption charges of former Governor Rod Blagojevich:

“Justice has been served today with the conviction of former Governor Rod Blagojevich. This conviction sends a message to the people of Illinois that when you abuse the power of elected office for your own benefit you deserve the harshest consequences. Hopefully this sad chapter can now be put behind us as we look forward to a brighter future for Illinois.”

Congressman Dold issued the following statement after the jury reached a verdict on Former Governor Blagojevich:

“I am pleased that the jury reached a consensus and I think it is time that we focus on the important issues like creating jobs for the people of our great state and reining in out-of-control government spending. Earlier this month I introduced a bill that would stop taxpayer funded Congressional pensions from going to convicted felons like the former Governor. Enough is enough. We need to work together to create jobs and stop wasting the taxpayer’s money.”

Springfield, Ill. – In response to the June 27 verdict in the federal case against former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, State Sen. Kirk Dillard (R-Hinsdale) issued the following statement:

“As the sponsor of the first major ethics reforms to pass the Legislature in the past 25 years, I have always placed the integrity of state government at the forefront of my career. Now that we have read the book on Rod Blagojevich and closed the last chapter, it is important that we don’t lose track of the message. The message is, we need to constantly press forward with reforms in campaign financing and transparency. Along those lines, for the past two years I have tried to have the State Senate adopt all of the recommendations of former U.S. Attorney Patrick Collins’ Illinois Reform Commission (Collins was the prosecutor of former Gov. George Ryan).

“We are all worse for former Governor Blagojevich’s behavior, and the guilty verdict in the trial was disappointing given that yet another politician from Illinois has been convicted of a crime. As unfortunate as this time is in the history of Illinois, it serves as a call for ethics reform and the need for true public servants to serve Illinois. The people of this state deserve a return to true public service from its elected officials.

As we put the politics of the past behind us, we must restore confidence and integrity to government by not tolerating this kind of behavior from elected officials.”

The jury today has ratified the sense of millions of Illinoisans, that Rod Blagojevich was a pox on Illinois' political system. His conviction also serves as a warning that no one is above the law and that anyone today thinking of abusing the public trust for their private benefit should consider the very real consequences. The jury today made clear that criminal acts are not "just politics." Blagojevich, and many of his advisors and staff, are facing serious prison time, financial penalties, and separation from their families and friends.

Illinois has taken great strides to ensure that the next scandal will not follow the Blagojevich blueprint. Today's laws make it much harder to commit yesterday's actions. But preventing tomorrow's scandals require more vigilance. Voters must demand accountability from candidates. Officeholders must stand ready to call out their wavering colleagues. Staffers must understand the risks they take when they follow criminal orders. Reform is possible, one step at a time, and Illinois has a long road ahead.

State Senator Bill Brady (R., Bloomington) issued the following statement on the conviction of former Governor Rod Blagojevich on 17 counts of wire fraud, extortion and bribery.

“I believe our state will grow stronger as a result of the conviction of Rod Blagojevich today. Rod Blagojevich abused the office of Governor and made every attempt to capitalize on his public office for personal and political benefit.

Washington, DC – Congressman Aaron Schock (R-IL) issued the following statement after former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was found guilty on 17 of 20 counts:

"At long last, Rod Blagojevich has been found guilty. He has put Illinois through the wringer with his corruption as Governor and then with his antics on trial. His outrageous behavior before and after being impeached as Governor has shamed Illinois.

MT. VERNON IL – State Sen. John O. Jones (R-Mt. Vernon) discussed the conviction of former Governor Rod Blagojevich on federal corruption charges after a northern Illinois jury returned a verdict on numerous counts.

“These convictions, along with the previous one, validate and clearly support the impeachment process that lawmakers carried out over two years ago. I can speak from personal experience that Governor Blagojevich only acted on what mattered to Blagojevich. A Chicago Tribune columnist once reported that Blagojevich ignored and even used an obscenity to describe a letter sent from my office to aid a constituent,” Jones said. “I have said this before, but hopefully this is beginning of the end of the Blagojevich saga. I do have sympathy for the Blagojevich children because of their father’s actions in the national media."

SPRINGFIELD, IL – State Sen. Shane Cultra (R-Onarga) discussed the conviction of former Governor Rod Blagojevich on federal corruption charges after a northern Illinois jury returned a verdict on numerous counts.

“This will help us close an ugly chapter of state history. Our state needs to return to the days of honest and clean government,” Cultra said. “The people of Pontiac and the workers at the Pontiac Correctional Center can speak to the abuses of power by the former Governor, because he tried to shut down the prison twice. Our state has been set back decades because of the poor choices made by the Blagojevich administration.”

WASHINGTON - United States Senator Mark Kirk (R) today released the following statement on the Rod Blagojevich trial verdict:

"Today's verdict is a stark reminder that no one is above the law. This decision is the culmination of a tumultuous two and a half years for the people of Illinois and Rod Blagojevich must now face the consequences of his corrupt actions.

"I commend the work of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald and his team. Now it's time to close this unfortunate chapter in our history and focus on tackling the difficult issues we face at home in Illinois and across the country."

“It was clear that Rod Blagojevich conspired to use the Governor's office for personal gain. He inflicted real, permanent damage on the state during his six years in office. Unfortunately, future generations will be paying for his Administration for years to come.

I am as anxious as everyone to now put this sordid chapter in our state’s history behind us. But some will want to use this verdict to close the door on reform. Instead, it is our job as elected officials to make sure the public has confidence in the integrity of their government. We all have a responsibility to send a clear signal that Illinoisans do not need to tolerate even the appearance of conflicts of interest by elected officials. We must put the politics of the past behind us.”